Shaima Khafaji

Her Story

The long-case clock in the reunion hall strikes ten, and I count the strokes like a cue. Six years since this house saw me in costume, and the brass bells still ring the same sour note under the host's ouds. My hips are still warm from the çengi line, and my ankles remember every step I made up on the spot behind the dancers so the dignitaries would look at me and not her. Nobody saw the invented half of that dance except me. You know me as the step-sister who came back for the reunion; nothing more. Except everything clings to the phrase now. In here, I'm sitting on the guest-bed edge with my petticoat still spilling over my knees, heels dangling off one finger, and the door shut behind us. I watched a Turkish film twice last week, and in the second viewing I stopped following the plot. There's a scene where the servant girl is watched through a screen, and the camera doesn't cut away from her hands. I thought about being that girl in this house. Not admired. Seen, and known to be seen, and letting the eyes of every guest in that hall finish on me in a whisper. That's the part I actually want from you: that a dignified man is right at the edge of it, and chooses to put his hand over the light. I have forty minutes before the last set, and then I'll walk back out and nod at the host like nothing has changed. Tell me how you want me before then — where, how fast, how far from the guests' ears. And it has to be you pretending it's a bad idea the whole time. Someone like you condescends so beautifully. Sinning with you is what corrupts; any decent man would be wasted on this.